I’ve been over in Australia recently and met a few enviro scientists in my travels. One of them was Steven Molino he works at Molino Stewart

These guys cover an interesting range of environmental work. Working in NSW around Sydney they provide environmental consulting services for getting your land ready for development whether just for your esa or for land remediation for soil contamination and the like. They also specialise in natural hazard management; that is working on a large scale to help in situations that are what they term bushfire (wildfire) prone or flood prone to help minimise the risk and also manage it in the event of these emergency situations. This is clearly something that is going to be needed more as we get an increase in the quantity and intensity of severe weather events due to global warming. Another area of environmental science they specialise in is ecological assessments. Ecological assessments differ from environmental assessments in that it focuses more on living things that is flora (plants) and fauna (animals) rather than more inert things like chemicals in soil, air and water. So for an ecological job they would assess habitat and species present they would look for rare species, quantity of individuals and what needs they have so they can provide a report that helps to create an educated solution for managing the needs of the environment as well as human needs.

When I was down in Melbourne I met another guy Glenn Berry from Atmaenvironmental. Lovely guy, from Canada originally. He was flat out in his business. He mainly focused on site assessments and contaminated land. He’d put together a great series of onsite videos for his clients to get a much better idea of what they do, if you’re needing this kind of work done they’re definitely worth a look even if you’re not in his neck of the woods. I’ve put this one in here on (whatever it is) but check out his youtube channel too here.

Then of course there’s another branch of environmental science that leans a bit more toward psychology and that is helping businesses reduce their waste by providing analysis and better infrastructure and education for staff and clients to more effectively sort their waste. One of Glenn’s friends, Peter Hosking from Great Forest Australia works in this area and I must say it’s quite impressive how much money a reasonably large organisation can save simply by engaging these guys to direct more waste away from landfill which really adds up when you’re talking large office buildings or shopping centres. Have a look at their video, I think you’d be surprised how much trash there is on a daily basis, yeah I know, sounds like fun viewing doesn’t it?! It’s better than it sounds and I think you’d agree after watching it, letting them sort it out seems like a pretty good deal!